Organs-on-chips win London’s Design Museum award

Wyss Institute’s’ human organs–on–chips have been honoured, by London’s Design Museum, as the world's pre–eminent, most forward–thinking design to have emerged within the last year.

Human organs–on–chips, which have been awarded the Design of the Year 2015 Award, have the potential to deliver transformative changes to human health, drug discovery, drug testing, and personalized medicine, due to their accurate ability to emulate human–level organ functions.

The Wyss Institute's human organs-on-chips, represented by the human lung, gut and liver chips, have won the overall Design of the Year 2015 Award. The honour was revealed during the annual Design of the Year awards ceremony, held on the evening of June 22 at the Design Museum of London.

Gemma Curtin, who is the Designs of the Year 2015 exhibition curator, said: "This winning design is a great example of how design is a collaborative practice embracing expertise and know how across disciplines. Its selection as Design of the Year 2015 also signifies a desire to recognize and award design that can significantly impact society now and in the future."

Human organs–on–chips received their nomination from Paola Antonelli, the Museum of Modern Art's senior curator of architecture & design and director of R&D, who said: "This is the epitome of design innovation – elegantly beautiful form, arresting concept and pioneering application."

The, organs-on-chips microdevices have the potential ability to deliver transformative change to pharmaceutical development and human healthcare due to the accuracy at which they emulate human organ–level functions. They stand to significantly reduce the need for animal testing by providing a faster, less expensive, less controversial and accurate means to predict whether new drug compounds will be successful in human clinical trials.

As the 2015 recipient of the Design of the Year Award, the human organs–on–chips design is the latest winner in the annual award series.

Wyss founding director Donald E. Ingber, M.D., Ph.D., said: “To have the microscopic elegance and function of human organs–on–chips recognized in an international design forum is a powerful testament to the breadth and depth at which design principles contribute to biological function as well as technological advancement, and it is a recognition for which I am deeply honoured to receive on behalf of the Wyss Institute."